Every once in a while a brilliant idea hits me and sticks! Such is the case with the plethora of eggs I ended up with during a spell in December! I had asked for unwashed eggs from one of my "egg dealers" and they provided an 18 pack along with an 18 pack of washed ones for us to eat!
The unwashed ones I wanted so that I could try "Water Glassing Eggs" aka "Lime Eggs". I had been hearing about it for a while and decided to check it out.
Lisa Bass at The Farm House On Boone has great directions and advice for this!
It takes Pickling lime, filtered water, a great glass jar and unwashed eggs! Simple! When I say unwashed eggs they are eggs that have not had the "bloom" taken off them by washing them in any solution - straight outta the chicken is what you want! I did wipe off a few bits of feather or dirt with a tissue - very gently so as not to remove the bloom. Seems to have worked fine but the cleaner the egg laying boxes are the cleaner your eggs will be - straight outta the chicken!
Mix 1 oz (6 tsp of my product) Mrs Wages Pickling lime with 1 quart of filtered water and stir it in to incorporate it. It doesn't dissolve into the water - it will look cloudy or milky - no worries - still good! I used filtered water out of my fridge filter - mind doesn't make cold water - its basically filtered room temp water - if yours makes cold water - let it warm up to room temperature before using!
Gently lower the eggs "pointy side down" into the lime water. My eggs did not stay pointy side down and Im not sure it matters at all? Just be gentle - I used a long handled wooden spoon to help me lower them into the jar and that worked well.
Once you have a dozen or so eggs in there (I put 18 in this jar to start and they all fit with about 2 inches of the water on top, Im sure it depends on the size of the eggs too) you can seal up the jar. I just used a Ball lid and ring system for mine.
Here you can see the Mrs Wages Pickling lime bag - I got mine from Amazon but you might be able to find it local too.
Then store the jar in a cool dark place! Easy peasy! The label you see here is how I am doing my jars. This way if something didn't work I can adjust and retry. I just did another jar of this size today.
The lime on the bottom of the jar is normal and nothing to worry about! There is still wnough lime inthe water to preserve the eggs! DO NOT try to tip the jar and mix it in! You might break one of the eggs and ruin the whole batch! It wont dissolve in anyway! The water takes all it needs and leaves the rest on the bottom!
Truuuusssssttttt Mmmmeeeeee!
So - here we are 4 months later getting ready to use a couple of the glassed eggs to make cookies! I took out the amount I needed - in this case two. They smelled and looked fine and the shell didn't really feel "fragile" like I expected.
I started by cracking them into another bowl first just to make sure - didnt want yukky eggs in my batter if this process hadnt worked!
First one and the yolk didnt even break! Beautiful! Smells good and looks good!
Second egg - I broke the yolk on this one cracking it but still smelled like an good egg and looks good!
Into the batter bowl they went and made perfect cookies! They didnt taste funny or make a different dough and no one who tasted one could tell that the eggs had been stored for 4 months in a jar of lime water!
I have not stored eggs for two years yet - I have heard that they can be stored for at least two years - I will keep you posted as I go! I dont know if you can use the lime water again - I have not been able to discover that. I have however added eggs to the startup jar and not had any problems with them!
May you be brave enough to try this and blessed enough to have eggs anytime you need them!
Blessed Be in All Things!
